Ether.com (currently in beta ) is a service where you can offer consulting online. You set your rate, set your hours of accepting calls and they handle the rest. They take 15% of your income from the call. Sounds interesting but there is some history to be aware of.
The idea is pretty straightforward. You can set up a price at which people can call you. So, if you’re an expert in something, you could, conceivably let people call you to pick your brain for a set price for a set time period. Does this sound familiar? Well, it certainly sounds like a web-based version of 1-900 numbers. And, if that sounds familiar, you may recall that greatly overhyped Keen.com hit the scene in late 1999 offering what sounds to be… um… the exact same thing (with over $70 million in funding): anyone could set themselves up as an expert to be called for a fee. It didn’t take long before Keen basically became an alternative to the 1-900 system, and rather than “experts” selling their time (as the company pitched when it launched) many of its customers were in the phone sex and psychic hotline business.
Everything Old Is New Again… Including Some Of The Exact Same Startups